Well, the ink is hardly dry on my previous blog post, Web search tips for thematic programming of a concert/recital, and now fellow techie singer Katia H. has created a search tool that searches all of the websites mentioned in my post, in one fell swoop! It’s over at classicalsongsearch.com. It’s still in alpha so there still might be some kinks to work out, but give it a whirl and let Katia know if you have any problems or suggestions!
Grazie mille, Katia!
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So one of the things that’s been sucking away at my time for blog-writing these last couple months is that I’ve been organizing and programming a benefit concert. While hunting for pieces related to the concert themes, it occurred to me to share some of the Google-fu that I use for finding music. I’m sure these tips are old hat to some of you tech-savvy singers, but others might find them useful.
So, one of my objectives was to find vocal solo or small ensemble pieces from the opera, art song, musical theater, or popular genres on the theme of “gold” or “golden”, since the concert benefits an organization celebrating its golden anniversary season. I did this by using keyword searches on the following websites:
Several of these sites contain texts in various translations, so I made sure to search for translated versions of my keywords, too. E.g., in addition to searching for “gold” I would also search for terms “oro”, “d’or”, etc. (It had to be “d’or” for French since “or” would yield too many search results in English texts!) Translating the search terms is less necessary for some of the sites, like The Lied, Art Song, and Choral Texts Archive and Aria Database because they have English translations of many texts, so my keyword search for “gold” will still yield songs in other languages. Other sites like Opernführer might only have the libretto in the original language or in German, for example, so translating the search keywords is a definite help there.
As for search engines – some of the sites above have a very good site search feature, e.g. The Lied, Art Song, and Choral Texts Archive and AllMusicals.com, so you can just go directly to their website and enter the keywords into the search form there. But sometimes a website doesn’t have a site search feature (e.g. OperaGlass), the site search feature is too specialized for a general text search (Aria Database), or the site search does not return results of sufficient quantity or quality. In this case, you can do a Google search with the following syntax in order to narrow your search results to a particular site – just include “site:” followed by the domain name of the website to search, with no space in-between:
gold site:opera.stanford.edu
Once I found song texts that fit my programming theme, I was able to track down scores for songs through online sheet music sellers, IMSLP, CPDL, or by using WorldCat to find scores in libraries local to me.
8/26/13 UPDATE 1: Fellow techie singer Katia H. has created a search tool that searches all of the websites mentioned above, in one fell swoop! It’s over at classicalsongsearch.com – check it out!
8/26/13 UPDATE 2: Glendower Jones contributed this very useful info in the comments for this post:
This is great advice. Many folks may not know of the many massive reference books on vocal repertoire that were written by Sergius Kagen, Noni Espina, Michael Pilkington, Judith Carman, Graham Johnson, Shirley Emmons and Carol Kimball. A very useful reference is Pazdirek, the BBC Song Catalogue and Classical Vocal Music in Print and of course Groves and MGG. I don’t know, but possibly some of these books may now be on Google books.
These are some of the major references but still only a drop in the bucket. Pazdirek, Universal-Handbuch der Musikliteratur was produced in Vienna from 1904-1910 and contained the compilation of practically every music publisher active at the time. This was reprinted in 1967 in the Netherlands and is now free online. Few musicians know of this amazing work. http://archive.org/details/universalhandboo01pazd
Also, in a Facebook comment, Nicholas Perna adds:
As a shameless plug, I can also recommend readers search for Britten’s entire output using The Comprehensive Britten Song Database! www.brittensongdatabase.com
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A while back, I blogged about wanting an iPad scanning stand that was portable, inexpensive, and would work with bound books. I was planning to make my own stand, but I got lazy and purchased this inexpensive locker shelf instead:
Magna Card Locker Shelf / Credit: Amazon.com
The locker shelf folds flat. Conveniently, I already own a bag that is the right size for it:
Yesterday, I took the locker shelf and my iPad with the Scanner Pro app installed to the music library for a test drive. This time around, I wasn’t scanning scores, but rather a few pages from the Nico Castel libretti books. Here’s what my setup looked like (click any of the images for the full-sized version):
Here’s a sample of the image quality from the original camera image:
And here’s a sample of the image quality after Scanner Pro has fixed the color and converted it to a PDF file:
My observations about the scanning process:
Lewis N. Clark Add-A-Bag Luggage Strap / Credit: Amazon.com
In the future I might use something simple like small binder clips to secure the legs against collapsing while my iPad is on it:
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Credit: Amazon.com
MP3 accompaniment tracks are a really handy thing to have loaded up on your smartphone, tablet, or laptop. They are useful as a mobile practice aid when you’re away from your pianist, especially in conjunction with a music score reading app like forScore or unrealBook that lets you link an audio track to a score for easy playback during study. MP3 accompaniment tracks will even do in a pinch for performance situations where live accompaniment is not an option (but see the note below about performance licenses).
Many of the websites that sell accompaniment tracks have audio samples so you can judge the quality of the sound and the pianist. They may also sell spoken-text diction audio tracks in which a coach or native speaker runs through the pronunciation of the aria or song text. In fact, some sites offer whole packages of learning tracks for full opera roles that include diction tracks and accompaniment tracks with and without the vocal line and vocal/orchestral cues.
If you want to use your MP3 track for live performance or on YouTube or other recordings, you will probably be required to get a license. Some of the websites make this very easy – you can add a license to your shopping cart the same way you add an MP3 track you’re purchasing.
Here are some websites that offer accompaniment tracks:
MP3 Accompaniment Tracks
Your Accompanist – MP3 piano accompaniment tracks of songs and arias, with or without the vocal line. In addition to their broad catalog, they handle custom requests. (I’ve purchased tracks and custom orders from them with good results.)
MP3Accompanist.com – MP3 piano accompaniment tracks of songs and arias. Some tracks are available in different tempi or different keys. They have a sizable catalog and also accept custom requests. In addition, they offer spoken text tracks for selected songs and arias. (I’ve had a decent experience purchasing from them as well.)
Opera Karaoke – MP3 piano accompaniment tracks for arias, vocal line tracks, and diction tracks. They also sell video tracks that display the aria text as the music plays. The video tracks are supposed to be compatible with iPhones and Android in addition to Windows/Mac/Linux. They accept custom requests. Also, they provide a useful tutorial on using Audacity to change the pitch and or tempo of an MP3 accompaniment track (this method works on any MP3 track, not just theirs).
Karaoke Opera – MP3 orchestral accompaniment tracks (using a real orchestra) for greatest-hits arias and duets from opera, Gilbert & Sullivan, Messiah/oratorio, and Broadway. Available from Amazon and iTunes.
CANTOLOPERA – Orchestral accompaniment tracks (using a real orchestra) for greatest-hits arias and a couple of full operas, plus some Italian songs. They sell the tracks on CD (which you can probably rip) but also as MP3 albums and individual MP3 tracks on Amazon, iTunes, and Google Play Store.
Opera Practice Perfect – MP3 and CD piano accompaniment tracks of roles, complete operas, and accompagnato recits. They also have a couple of the major concert works, e.g. Messiah and Verdi Requiem.
Pocket Coach – MP3 piano and orchestral accompaniment tracks, diction tracks, scores, and libretto/translation booklets. Repertoire is pretty diverse and includes opera, oratorio/concert works, art song, religious solo, vocal method books/student repertoire, songs for children, and Gilbert & Sullivan. Many languages are represented, including Czech and Spanish. They have a separate storefront for MP3 downloads.
I sometimes run into random one-off collections of MP3 accompaniment tracks, for example this Schubert: Lieder without Singer album on Amazon.
Accompaniment CDs
(You can probably rip these to MP3 for use on your mobile device)
Coach Me – CDs with piano accompaniment tracks for full roles (with and without vocal line) plus spoken-text tracks by native speakers and a libretto/translation booklet. They also have assorted lieder and some major concert works, e.g. Messiah, St. Matthew Passion, Mozart/Verdi Requiems.
Music Minus One – Piano and orchestral accompaniment tracks for arias, songs, and other styles (e.g. Broadway) on CD.
Classical Karaoke – An umbrella site that showcases accompaniment CDs from different publishers. One nice thing about this site is that you can browse by album, composer, opera, role, or aria.
Aria and song anthology books often have corresponding accompaniment CDs, for example the art song anthologies from Hal Leonard.
MIDI Tracks
Classical MIDI with Words – A modest selection of free MIDI tracks for arias and songs. The sounds are a bit cheesy, but hey, it’s free.
Classical Archives: MIDI – Large collection of classical MIDI tracks, and not just for vocalists. This is a pay site and I’m not sure if it’s subscription-based or pay-by-the-track. They do have a free trial period and they may also offer a free download or two of your choosing.
Many thanks to Jeffrey Snider who started the thread on the New Forum for Classical Singers that helped me to write this post.
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Credit: Greg Lindahl
Following up on the topic of an earlier post, “Working with music texts, Part 2: Translate the text,” there are times when we need to translate archaic words or spellings that have fallen out of modern usage and are nowadays only encountered in a literary context such as poetry or libretti. Fortunately, there are quite a few websites, apps, and e-books to help with deciphering these bits of antiquated language. Note that several of them are historic dictionaries in the original language, so depending on your level of fluency, you may want to have a translation reference or tool handy for translating the definitions.
Italian
German
N. B.: I’ve heard that for translating much of the German repertoire, one might have more success using a pre-WWII dictionary that pre-dates the spelling reforms of the mid- to late-20th century.
English
If you have any digital resources to add to this list, let me know!
This post was inspired, and much of the information gleaned, from this discussion thread in the archives of the New Forum for Classical Singers. A hat-tip to the folks there who share their expertise.
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Credit: The Juilliard Store
This is part 2 of the Tech tools for working with music texts series.
Step 2: Translate the text
My next step is to translate the text I’m singing. I like to do a word-for-word translation and write it into my score. If I’m short on time, or if I have difficulty translating the text myself, I’ll look for a translation from one of these sources. Some of them have literal translations, some have poetic translations, and some have both. I generally double-check the translations I find online, as they occasionally contain mistakes.
If I’m doing the translation myself, these are the main tech tools and references I use:
If I got really stuck on a translation problem, another option would be to post the translation work I have done so far on a forum like ChoralNet, the New Forum for Classical Singers, or a language-learning forum and ask the community for help.
As I work, I like to type my translation into the Evernote or Dropbox document I created earlier that contains the original text. Once my translation is done, I can write it into my score on my iPad with the forScore app’s annotation feature. I can either use the “Draw” option and write it in freehand with my stylus (zooming in if there’s limited space to write in) or the “Type” option and type it in, adding extra spaces between words so that my word-for-word translation lines up properly with each word of the original text. I may also write in a paraphrase or poetic translation, in a different color than the literal translation just so my eye can distinguish. If there’s some pesky, godawful singing translation already printed in the score, I can erase it first using forScore’s “Whiteout Pen” option.
It’s during these kinds of tasks that I really appreciate having a tablet. I like having the equivalent of a big, heavy bookshelf full of dictionaries and reference books and scores all on this slim little tablet that I can take anywhere. The information is accessible to me at any time and place, so I can work on the translation wherever I happen to be. With my translation document stored in the cloud using Evernote or Dropbox, I can read it or work on it regardless of whether I have my laptop, iPad, or phone with me.
There are some other kinds of translation tech resources that I haven’t looked into yet but would like to, for example, translation-related iPad apps (myLanguage Translator Pro looks interesting and has good reviews) and also dictionaries/references in app or ebook format that work offline. But I will have to save that for a future blog post.
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This is part 1 of the Tech tools for working with music texts series.
Step 1: Find the text – preferably in a form I can cut/paste
Here are some websites I use to look up cut-and-paste-friendly texts for various kinds of vocal repertoire:
It’s not unusual for me to have to do some quality control and vetting of texts I find online. Sometimes they are well-edited. Other times I run across questionable quality, discrepancies due to different editions, or translation mistakes.
Ebooks are another way to get texts, sometimes for free. For example, here are free ebook libretti at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Project Gutenberg. Apple’s iBooks store has some free opera libretti too. To read the Amazon and B&N ebooks, you can download the Kindle app or Nook app for most tablets and smartphones.
If a text isn’t available in a convenient electronic format, there are, of course, lots of printed reference books too. One could try scanning the text or libretto from a book using the OCR option on your scanning software and extracting the text that way.
Once I have the text in electronic format, I upload it to a cloud-based service so that I can access it anytime from my laptop, iPad, or smartphone. This way, I always have the text with me to study and review. I can view the texts on my iPad, where my score library already lives. And if I’m translating or annotating the text, I can work on it on my iPad while I’m on the go.
So far, I’ve been using Evernote (like a notepad app in the cloud) to store and edit plain text versions, or Dropbox if the text is in a PDF document. Since forScore can import PDFs from Dropbox, I can put my text into a forScore setlist together with my score. In the future, I might try out a more heavy-duty iPad/Android office suite such as Quickoffice Pro HD that would let me edit texts as a Word document, sync them to my Dropbox, and export them to PDF files that could be transferred to forScore.
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Credit: Wikimedia
I have a system for learning texts for works of music. I’m continually trying to make improvements to it, and to make myself actually follow the process. My process is a little bit different for concert/recital works vs. stage works, but it goes something like this:
In the next few posts, I’ll discuss some of the tech tools and online resources I use to get things done when I’m learning texts.
Technology for the Classical Singer 